Japanese Surrealism with a raw and bitter vision of man in a society that depersonalize him, making it little more than a cog in the service of consumption and production. Expressionless faces that seem to always be the same, with a patina of desolation and melancholy.

Tetsuya Ishida was a Japanese painter born in Yaizu, Shizuoka (1973), best known for his surreal portrayal of an ordinary Japanese life. He presumably committed suicide in 2005 by jumping off a train.

He attended Yaizu Central High School until his graduation in 1992. Ishida stated in interviews that it was during this period that his parents, and his principal, applied pressure on him to thrive academically well enough to develop a teaching or chemist career. This experience later appeared in some of his paintings that explore the society's expectations of youths.

Ishida entered Musashino Art University where he majored in Visual Communication Design until his graduation in 1996. Ishida's parents, unhappy about his career choice, refused to provide financial support during his university period, which Ishida recalled with amusement for his rare interviews.

Ishida and film director Isamu Hirabayashi, a friend from his university days, formed a multimedia company to work together as collaborators on film/art fusion projects. After experiencing economic difficulties during Japan's 1990s-era recession their joint venture shifted to became a graphic design company. Ishida left the company to develop his own career as a solo artist.

From 1997 to 2005, he won a growing following, a number of awards and exhibitions, and positive praise of his works, which enabled him to work full-time as an artist until his death.

On May 23 in 2005, he was instantly killed by a train at a level crossing in Machida, Tokyo. He was 31 years old.

"待機 / Esperando una oportunidad / Waiting for a Chance"

Acrílico sobre panel / acrylic on board, 145,6 x 206 cm., 1999

"スーパーマーケット / Supermercado / Supermarket"

Acrílico sobre panel / acrylic on board, 103 x 145,6 cm., 1997

Ishida's works feature three major themes: Japan's identity and role in today's world; Japan's social and academic educational structures, and Japanese people's struggles to adapt to social and technological changes in Japan's contemporary life.

He conveys isolation, anxiety, identity crisis, scepticism, claustrophia and solitude, incurred by these themes, by making school boys and business men as part of a factory and portraying young people, mostly young men, as physically integrated with everyday household objects. Such as a wash basin, a radiator, a toilet and a desk. His subjects have faces that resemble Ishida's own face. The resemblance suggests these are autobiographical, but Ishida had firmly denied this.

Ishida shared anecdotes of his parents expressing bewilderment over his art style and the dark nature of his works. His mother was particularly upset by one of his self-portraits as she felt it was too dark, but he assured her that it was him at his happiest because he felt he could communicate better through his painting than he could in person. He later reported that his parents came to accept his works as part of his personality and that they, particularly his father, were able to appreciate his works even though they still didn't understand his art.

In this documentary short directed by Peter I. Chang, author Mitch Cullin speaks about his fascination & quest to learn more about the elusive Japanese artist Tetsuya Ishida (石田徹也) while he was living in Tokyo. Serving both as a visual essay and an introduction to Ishida's surreal artwork, [SUB]URBAN is a haunting meditation on the price some creative individuals pay when striving to follow their own vision.

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